Congratulations to Professor Ben Saul for an amazing victory.
The United Nations Human Rights Committee has found Australia to be in violation of no fewer than 150 points of international law in relation to the indefinite detention of 40 asylum seekers.
Professor Saul is quoted as saying:
“It is a major embarrassment for Australia, which is a member of the Security Council and often criticises human rights in other countries. Australia should do the right thing by respecting its international obligations and treating the refugees decently.”
Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/federal-politics/federal-election-2013/australia-violated-refugees-human-rights-un-says-20130822-2sdxq.html (Edit Feb 2015: This article has now been archived by The Age and is no longer freely available.)
Please read the full article on The Age website. This may be just the precedent needed to force a more humane approach to people fleeing persecution and arriving in Australia.
Related articles
- Asylum boat capsizes off Australia (bbc.co.uk)
- Vote Compass: Kevin Rudd’s asylum seekers policy divides Labor faithful (abc.net.au)
- Rudd’s Refugee-Policy Shift Fails to Win Australia Voter Backing – Bloomberg (bloomberg.com)
- So now we dump people on third world countries
- STOP THE BOATS
- Swiss asylum seekers segregated (bbc.co.uk)
Random Observations of Life 
[…] The UN found we were in contravention of over 150 points of international […]
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What is even more telling is when the government psychiatrists in charge of the mental health of the asylum seekers says they are being treated in an inhumane manner and in fact goes to the press about it when asked by the government to suppress the information regarding self harming among children.
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Oh yes!!! Look at my closing sentence on this: https://teamoyeniyi.com/2011/11/18/detention-centres-dysfunctional/
You and I think very much alike! 🙂
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Oh, by the way, I’ve been writing a little flash fiction about an Immigration Minister who becomes an asylum seeker. You might like it. It starts https://teamoyeniyi.com/2013/06/09/what-goes-around-comes-around/
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[…] United Nations smacks Australia’s asylum seeker policies […]
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[…] although expected given the recent inhumane and illegal, under international law, changes to this county’s treatment of asylum seekers. What drew my attention even more was one small […]
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[…] What does the Refugee Convention actually say? We are signatories, after all, not that you would believe it given we are in major contravention of the terms! […]
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[…] Elysium. I heard reports of what a great movie it was. Icing on the cake was Matt Damon criticising Australia’s treatment of asylum seekers when he visited to promote the […]
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[…] United Nations smacks Australia’s asylum seeker policies (teamoyeniyi.com) […]
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